Basketball Season Recruiting

Today I'm going to give you a listing of all the places that I went for games for this past high school season. I'm not going to give you names of the kids because it's a NCAA violation. The Hamline Basketball schedule is mixed in there in bold as well so you can get an idea of how busy we are during our season. If you look through the schedule you will notice that most Sundays are off, but not for the coaches and players. Sunday is usually a prep day for Monday's game, so we almost always have practice. Sunday is also a big day to catch up with recruiting.

Nov. 15 - vs. Elmhurst (IL)
Nov. 17 - vs. Northwestern (MN)
Nov. 29 - vs. Buena Vista (IA)

Dec. 2 - vs. Augsburg
Dec. 3 – Forest Lake
Dec. 4 – St. Cloud Cathedral
Dec. 5 - vs. Macalester
Dec. 7 - @ St. Olaf
Dec. 8 – Forest Lake
Dec. 10 – St. Anthony Village
Dec. 12 - @ Concordia-Moorhead
Dec. 15 – Academy of Holy Angels
Dec. 18 – Janesville Parker, WI
Dec. 21 – Wheeling Holiday Tournament, IL
Dec. 22 – Blaine
Dec. 29 - @ Cal Lutheran Tourney vs. Wheaton
Dec. 30 - @ Cal Lutheran Tourney vs. Cal Lutheran

Jan. 2 - vs. Carleton
Jan. 4 - @ Bethel
Jan. 5 – Forest Lake
Jan. 6 - vs. St. Mary's
Jan. 8 – Shakopee
Jan. 9 - @ Gustavus
Jan. 12 – Minnehaha Academy
Jan. 13 - vs. St. John's
Jan. 15 - St. Cloud Cathedral
Jan. 18 - vs. St. Thomas @ Macalester
Jan. 19 – Minnehaha Academy
Jan. 20 - @ Augsburg
Jan. 21 – Janesville Craig, WI
Jan. 22 – St. Cloud Cathedral
Jan. 23 - @ Macalester
Jan. 25 – Minnehaha Academy
Jan. 26 – Robbinsdale Cooper
Jan. 27 - vs. St. Olaf
Jan. 28 – St. Cloud Cathedral
Jan. 29 – Forest Lake
Jan. 30 - @ Carleton


Feb. 1 - vs. Concordia-Moorhead
Feb. 2 – St. Anges
Feb. 3 - vs. Bethel
Feb. 5 – Breck School
Feb. 6 - vs. Gustavus
Feb. 9 – St. Cloud Cathedral
Feb. 10 - @ St. Mary's
Feb. 16 – Zimmerman
White Bear Lake
Feb. 17 - @ St. John's
Feb. 18 – St. Cloud Cathedral
Feb. 19 – Academy of Holy Angels
Feb. 20 - vs. St. Thomas
Feb. 23 - MIAC Quarterfinal @ Carleton
Feb. 24 – Minnehaha Academy
Feb. 25 – Totino Grace
Feb. 26 – Shakopee
Feb. 27 – St. Anthony Village

Mar. 1 – Hill-Murray
Minnehaha Academy
Mar. 2 - Hastings
Mar. 5 – St. Thomas Academy
Mar. 10 – Holy Angels - Sectionals
Mar. 11 – Forest Lake - Sectionals
Mar. 12 – Hill-Murray - Sectionals
Mar. 13 – Howard Lake-Waverly-Winsted - Sectionals
Mar. 16 – Arlington HS - Sectionals
Elk River HS - Sectionals
Mar. 18 – Kohl Center – WIAA States
Mar. 24 – Target Center – MSHSL States

Some practices that I attended were not included. One must remember that this is just my recruiting schedule and not the other coaches.

NABC All-District Team

Nice to see that there are people that actually have a clue. The NABC's All-District Teams came out and Carl Hipp was voted on a Second Team All-District member with fellow MIAC player Aaron Burtzel from St. John's. Tyler Nicolai from St. Thomas was voted First Team.

You can find the list by following this link on the NABC website. (It's a PDF file so it might take a while).

Also, congrats to Coach Mike Maker and his Williams College Ephs making the Final Four. Coach "Makes" worked with me at West Virginia and has been very instrumental in my coaching career.

D3hoops.com All Region

D3hoops.com All Region teams were announced yesterday. Congrats to all the players on the first, second, and third teams (like the MIAC should do it). West Region teams are here. I'm just going to go out on a limb here (insert sarcasm). A few of these selections are complete jokes. John Fraase from Concordia is a good player and good enough to be All-Conference but isn't an All-Region player let alone a 2nd team, ahead of our conference's MVP, Tyler Nicolai. I don't think Fraase is even the best player on his team let alone a top ten player in the West region.

Are they trying to say that neither Ray Brown or Carl Hipp aren't one of the best 15 players in the West? What a disservice to these kids. On top of that, Aaron Burtzel, second leading vote-getter for MVP of the MIAC isn't on the list either. Come on people, have a clue.

At least they got one thing right on Freshmen (not First year) of the Year Chris Palmer. He was a stud for them and clearly should be awarded.

MIAC Awards

The MIAC awards just came out the other day and was filled with Hamline players. Both Ray Brown and Carl Hipp were All Conference. Carl was also All Defensive Team. Jordan Schmidt and Noah Aguirre were two of the five guys on the All Freshmen Team. You can look at the rest of the awards here.

Based off the votes, both Ray and Carl would be First Team All League but unfortunately, the league basically decides anyone who is nominated for All Conference gets at least Honorable Mention. What a joke that is. There should be a First Team, Second Team, and a Third Team and that's it.

There is also a Sportsmanship Award that goes to one player from each team. In the famous words of Jack Byrnes (Robert DeNiro) in Meet the Fockers, "I didn't know they gave out 9th place ribbons."